1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to Bluetooth™ communications. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method of establishing a Bluetooth™ communication channel between a master device and a target slave device.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the rapid development of electronics and communication technologies, the mobile terminal has become one of essential tools in everyday life. Recent mobile phones are equipped with various functions. These functions may include playing music, sending text messages, taking pictures using a camera, and Bluetooth™ communication functions. These functions are in addition to the basic telephone voice communication function. Bluetooth™ is an open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances (using short length radio waves) from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks (PANs) with high levels of security. Created by telecoms vendor Ericsson™ in 1994, the communication protocol was originally conceived as a wireless alternative to RS-232 data cables. The communication protocol can be used, for example, to connect several devices, overcoming problems of synchronization.
Bluetooth™ is one of the short range radio frequency technologies for establishing communication links between Bluetooth™-enabled devices within the Bluetooth™ radio coverage range. In the basic Bluetooth™ connection establishment procedure of a mobile terminal, the mobile terminal scans a predetermined area to discover Bluetooth™ devices within the Bluetooth™ radio range and displays a list of the discovered Bluetooth™ devices on a display associated with the mobile terminal. The user can select a Bluetooth™ enabled device from the list on a display associated with the mobile terminal so as to establish a Bluetooth™ connection through a process called pairing. However, the conventional Bluetooth™ link establishment procedure has several drawbacks. First of all, the device discovery process continues even when a target Bluetooth device is found. This is due to the fact that the discovery process will continue until a predetermined discovery time expires. At the conclusion of the time period, the discovery process expires and does not expire when the target device is located. This extra discovery process may result, in an unnecessary waste of time and power and may reduce the mobile terminal battery life. Battery life is a critical factor in selecting a communication device to a consumer.
Also, another problem is that in the conventional Bluetooth™ link establishment procedure, the mobile terminal displays a list of available devices with the model names of the found devices. If there are several devices with the same model names it may not be easy for the user to identify the desired target Bluetooth™ device and the user may inadvertently select the incorrect device by accident. This may occur particularly when there are Bluetooth devices having the same model name. This can be inconvenient and may cause the user to repeat the pairing device a second time.